


ROLLED ENTANGLEMENT: AFFAIRS OF STATE

by zealotarchaeologist



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, F/F, Flirting, Mecha, Mild Sexual Content, Relationship Study, Resolved Sexual Tension, Rivalry, Unresolved Emotional Tension, set in the timeskip between episode 20 and 21
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:13:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24792145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zealotarchaeologist/pseuds/zealotarchaeologist
Summary: Icebreaker Prime plays host to a gathering of revolutionaries. A month from now, their collection will first solidify and then begin to fracture as the practicalities of the movement and the competing ideologies within are thrown into focus. But for now, the experiment is still ripe with possibility. The luxuries have not yet run out, the quarters are not yet packed full. They are only playing at war. Before the millennium breaks, there is a month where it seems like something better might still be coming.
Relationships: Gucci Garantine/Clementine Kesh
Comments: 24
Kudos: 25





	1. belltower

**Author's Note:**

> i continue to have a clem/gucci problem so i might as well put it all in one place.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clementine tries to relieve some stress, to mixed results.

Once, when she was much younger, before she ever came to Partizan, Crysanth had taken her to a place that resembled a zoological park.

A white lion there, like many of the other animals, was a marvel of experimental technology. Genetic engineering based on descriptions of the past, knit together with the latest advancements in lab-grown biology from Stel Columnar. A near perfect replica, they assured her. It had first lain still in its cage on that warm day, listless, then started pacing. As Crysanth had been saying something imperious and cryptic, trying to impress on her the importance and symbolism of the animal half of the sphinx, she had watched the creature move. Back and forth, back and forth in that tiny space, over the same footsteps of a thousand days before. All that beautiful deadly muscle moving for nothing, slowly rotting away, building up force and energy on every lap as if preparing for some grand attempt at escape. But it did no such thing. It merely blinked at Clementine with its beautiful eyes and kept walking, and walking. Until it laid back down, as if even this effort was now too much for it to bear.

It's that creature that she thinks of now, hemmed in by the walls of her cabin and the collection of things that eat up the space around her. She wants to hit something; wants, with all the fury of a child, to sink her teeth into someone’s arm. It is apparently not enough that she must—must grapple with the thing she’s done, must learn to live without the future that has always been assured her. She is trying, at least, to hold her new and glorious vision close.

No, the thing that makes her burn with the rage of the impotent is how quickly and easily her authority has been set aside. She pulled the trigger that sent them here under the impression she would be leading. Instead she has been reduced to one voice among many. She’s not a prisoner—yet. But she’s not a ruler either. And when that vision of the future wavers, her compass sets to spinning.

It doesn’t help that they’ve just been sitting here for a month, debating what direction they should take. Clementine simply wants to take a direction. Being still for so long reminds her too much of the time she’s already wasted convalescing.

She misses, oddly, the dust of the battlefield. The chemical smell of the Panther’s cockpit. Out there, it is in its way easy—she will point and her loyal guns will shoot. The enemy is a machine in front of them that can be defeated. She can’t very well aim her gun at an ideological debate. So she’s stuck here, in the middle of the ocean, pacing in her cage. Wanting to hit something, shoot something. Sovereign recommends, again, that she practice. But even that chafes at her. She can’t spar with any of her team. They’ll win, and her authority will only be eroded further. Or Sovereign might pretend to lose, for her sake, but she will know he is pretending and she won’t be able to bear it.

Which leaves Clementine, unfortunately, with only one real option. That being the other reason behind her frustration.

She finds Gucci in Icebreaker’s expansive mess hall, eating with her crew. She hasn’t learned their names yet—and would have no interest in doing so if it did not seem so unequal, that Gucci should know hers and not the other way. They are laughing, easily, enjoying each other’s company and it makes her angry in a way she doesn’t know how to name. Another hot coal on the pile steadily building up in her chest. The lion pacing back and forth.

As she approaches, Gucci is biting delicately into a slice of orange, chasing sweetness with teeth and tongue. Clem tries not to focus on that. On her mouth.

She notices Clementine immediately, locking eyes but saying nothing until she’s reached their table. She can imagine it before it happens: Gucci’s perfectly raised eyebrow, the way she will ask _something you need, princess_ in that honeyed tone just this side of mocking. She will smile, just slightly, and Clementine will know she is being made fun of, and she will have already lost. So before any of this can happen, she slams her hand down on the table. None of the Horizon crew flinch, least of all Gucci.

“Spar with me.” She demands, before Gucci can say anything.

It’s only a second of silence, but Clem feels it stretch on, and on, and on, feels her face want to twist into an embarrassed scowl. She doesn’t, of course, because she’s a professional. And because Gucci tilts her face toward her to better deflect, and Clem readies herself to argue, to rage against the polite dismissal—

“Alright.” Gucci says, and takes a bite of her orange. She chews and swallows while Clem stands, dazed, not sure how to respond now that the argument she planned for hasn’t occurred. “Let me finish with my team and I’ll meet you—”

“No.” She presses without thinking, her voice too loud. “Now. Get ready and meet me on the flight deck.”

The sharp looking one with the blue hair stiffens up and the rest follow. They don’t like to hear their boss spoken to that way, clearly. Too damn bad, really--but Gucci is easing them down with a careful hand on their arm. She looks at Clementine then, really looks at her and Clem can feel it click into place, the shiver down her spine, the moment when she stops being princess and is just Clementine.

Slowly, Gucci shrugs and agrees, “Okay. Now.” The tension evaporates, her strange evaluation complete. Coming from her mouth it doesn’t sound like acquiescence, it sounds like victory. As if it were her idea all along. “Certainly we could both use the practice.”

She’ll never understand how Gucci does that trick, really, gave up trying years ago. “Right. Well.” It will never be the same for her. She can shove her way in anywhere, but she’ll never fit easily the way Gucci does. “Flight deck, then.”

Clem turns on her heel and stomps off before she can make more of an idiot of herself. _What are you doing, Clementine_ , she asks herself in her mother’s voice and no answer comes to mind. She feels like that lion, pacing back and forth for no reason, forever.

Icebreaker has space dedicated to practice, like any good military base would, but that’s not what she wants. She’s getting sick of the claustrophobic corridors, of the exposed piping, of the slightly-wrong temperature and humidity.

She misses high ceilings. She misses marble floors, and too many rooms to fill up, and people who follow her orders without a second thought. All this and more will be waiting, she reminds herself, when she takes Cruciat. And if there’s a part of her that feels more at home here than she has in any palace, well, she’s willing to sacrifice that on the altar of her ascent.

So Clem throws on a long white sundress and orders the Panther sent topside. The greatness of Fort Icebreaker is what lies inside, so they haven’t done much with the flight deck yet. Some of this ragtag coalition had landed there on the way in. But now it lies essentially abandoned, a speck of grey in the middle of the uncaring sea. It’s a clear day, hot in a way that speaks of the oncoming summer. The sun bears down on them. Seabirds pepper the railings, resting for a long flight over the ocean.

Gucci—no, Saint Dawn is already climbing into the Oblige when she gets there. It’s easy to pick her out, her severe red jumpsuit contrasting with the smoky white exterior of the mech. It hasn’t revealed its true face yet, but it holds a blue-lit partisan in each hand, ready and waiting.

She waves, but Clem ignores it, straps herself impatiently into the Panther’s cockpit. The dress, she realizes immediately, was a bad choice, leaving her arms exposed to every piece of rigging and rough metal. She has to pull it up to fit her legs in correctly. Stupid. The mech glows to life around her, an instant flow of information telling her that all security systems are online, targeting assistance is ready on her behalf. Sometimes it feels like it’s speaking in her mother’s voice. She wants to scream, and does, a little, behind clenched teeth.

She shuts it all down manually. One by one, all of the little tricks silenced. Until it’s just her and the Panther. Just her and—

Gucci, who is waiting for her to start. Clementine rolls her shoulders, stretches the mech’s limbs. Mouths a count of three, two, one—

Fires a warning flare to signal their start, one small red star. And then the Oblige is moving through the air, moving in on her. Faster than she can keep up with. Clementine fires—

But it goes wide, sprays wildly into the sky around them. She’s used to the machine compensating for her. Gritting her teeth, she tries again—

It’s better this time, catching the Oblige in its chest, but it does not slow. She wills the Panther to move, a second too late—

The gold glow of Future fills the cockpit for a moment, suspending her in time. And then it wasn’t too late after all, and she’s darting away as the Oblige crashes down into the deck, spears poised—

It wastes no time taking to the air again, shimmering. This time she chases it without a second thought, urging the Panther into the sky—

Where the Oblige is waiting, a bird of prey, to strike, partisan whipping out, intending to sever her mech’s arm, but Clementine has been practicing—

She knows this machine now, it’s not a toy but it is hers, it belongs to her, and she knows how to make it do as she commands—

And so the Panther splits, black fragments breaking off like so many little birds where the impact would have been. They launch at the Oblige, knocking one spear aside—

But the other is still outstretched, and so Clementine gambles, and as the Panther comes back together, she launches it, bodily—

To slam the entire thing into the Oblige and grapple, viciously, in midair. Neither of them can stay steady up there, they fall through the air in fits and starts, and Clementine does not let go. She lashes out, and the Panther lashes out with her, and she braces herself for the crash—

That never comes, as the Oblige regains control, leveling them out in the air. It’s no longer trying to throw her off, she realizes, it’s holding her close—

The better to reveal itself. It shudders and slides apart, opens up like a glass flower, fractal and infinite, all of it reflecting the sun, the thousands and thousands of faces of the people, of the Principality, and they _see_ her—

It drops her. She’s too dazed to react in time, and without autonomous security systems the Panther hits the deck hard—

It snaps her forward and back in the cockpit, knocking the breath out of her and sending a bright spark of pain that brings her back to her senses, just in time to see the Oblige descend—

And crash into the Panther, pinning her down, the impact jolting her around again. In a real fight she’d be dead and she knows this, her face red with it. Her chest burning. The Oblige presses forward, crushing, but still she fights, writhing hard and trying to twist the Panther out of its clutches. Warning lights blaze. The limbs are unresponsive and she can hear something cracking. This close, she can see into the head of the Oblige, can see Gucci mouthing _tap out, tap out_ at her and she can see Gucci, how could she not have seen all along that it was Gucci—

The Panther shudders and grinds to a halt, uncaring at the curses Clem is hissing in its cockpit. Gucci is easing the Oblige back and sliding out, walking over. Smiling a little at the sight of Clem tangled up in all her straps and gear, thrashing her way out like a trapped animal. She slams the exit open, struggles to pull herself out and upright, and manages only to tumble out onto the flight deck.

Gucci leans over her, barely suppressing her air of satisfaction. “Come on, princess. You did good.” She says easily, as if it costs her nothing to say. She extends her hand to Clementine, eyes glittering with pity and amusement.

Clementine hits her.

Or tries to, at least. She snarls, “Don’t pity me,” and swings wildly, easily missing Gucci’s face.

She’s aware, in that distant way that sounds like her mother, that she’s being childish. Stupid. Pathetic. She’s not only lost, but failed even to compose herself.

Gucci takes a step back as she drags herself to her feet, but Clem can see the tension in her arms, ready for another swing. It doesn’t come.

“Good match,” she spits, and turns on her heel to leave, doesn’t trust herself with anything else. The Panther lies there, deliberately abandoned in the empty expanse, left to bake in the sun. Another failure. For a moment, she thinks she hears someone calling her name as she leaves. But it’s only the gulls overhead.

Icebreaker Prime has mostly communal showers, a militarily efficient sort. And some kind of Apostolisian steam room she hasn’t quite figured out yet. Normally, Clem just orders a block clear when she wants to wash up and has Sovereign guard the doors. Today, she doesn’t bother. Just stalks in and switches on the water, lets it soak through her dress. Sweat and a little blood spiraling down the drains. No one joins her. Not that she had expected otherwise. Not that she had hoped.

She peels her dress and underwear off clumsily, letting the last of the fight wash off her. Little bands of bruising curl around her arms, her thighs where she’d strained against being strapped into the cockpit. She grazes her fingers against one, feels the dull ache. Stupid. Easily prevented. She has let her frustration get the better of her once again.

Clementine closes her eyes, focuses on the feeling of the water down her back. She thinks of the throne in the winter palace. She thinks of the stars. Of a warm touch on her thigh. Of her subjects, bringing her gifts, of Gucci, kneeling…

She turns the water off.

Gucci is waiting for her when she gets out. She leans casually against the wall as if it’s she, and not Clementine, who owns the place. Utterly at ease.

She feels suddenly underdressed in a soft ivory sweater and slacks, her hair still damp and miserably unstyled. But Gucci hasn’t even bothered to change, and she can’t wrap her head around whether that’s supposed to be some kind of power play or not and she’s tired, suddenly, of trying to think about things like that. She had thought—she had hoped it would be easy between them now. It had seemed so in her dream and what did she do all this for, if not to make that dream real? Instead Gucci seems more inscrutable than ever. It’s like being up close makes it even more impossible for her to see the full picture.

“I took the liberty of having your Panther attended to.” She says, smoothly, as if Clementine hadn’t at all humiliated herself. “You’ll find it in our corner of the hangar. I hope I didn’t overstep.”

Clementine makes a vague noise of assent and starts to walk away, wanting only to retreat and lick her wounds. To her surprise, Gucci takes up position beside her. Neither leading nor following, merely holding steady. It troubles her. Still, it would be impolite to ask her to leave. For this, and for no other reason, Clem takes a longer, more winding route back to her cabin.

“It’s a beautiful machine, really. Very elegant. I can’t imagine how you got your hands on such a thing.” In fact, she most certainly can easily imagine how: Crysanth. Clementine appreciates the courtesy, but it only digs a little deeper.

“Elegant but useless.” She scoffs. “It’s temperamental and…too slow, and overburdened with my mother’s meddling, and—simply not good enough.” She’s aware that she’s rambling, too sore to bother with composure. That’s no excuse, Clementine, she thinks, but it’s happening regardless. No one here to scold her, anyway.

Gucci only gives a little _hm_ , sympathetic and curious. “Not good enough for what?”

“What—” Clem blinks at her, not comprehending the question. “Well, for me, obviously.” She’s done her best, she’s _practiced_ and everything. It’s just that the mech is not good enough. And sometimes that’s—that’s just that, you can take a thing and train it and give it every advantage and it’s just not good enough because it’s—it’s not. Obviously.

“Hasn’t it carried you this far?” Gucci rests a hand on her arm. Not linking with hers, just a slight and subtle push. She slows her pace, taken off guard by the question. It’s absurd. It’s her own efforts, of course, that have brought them all here.

But the Panther did not fail her when the fog rolled in. It kept her safe, then. No, more than that: it had transformed her into a beacon. Had heralded her rise, the sphinx clawing its way into the sky. Whatever her misgivings about the situation now, she still feels almost a chill when she remembers it. And every time she thinks or dreams of it, she can’t truly imagine any outcome but pulling that trigger. Her future always begins with the Panther splitting itself apart, red flares going up…

Gucci takes advantage of her contemplation to steer her by the arm into a wider corridor. Here, Icebreaker’s veins open up into arteries. “A machine like that requires care and attention.” She says with a surprising tenderness, her voice low in Clementine’s ear. “Who knows. It may surprise us yet.”

She can feel her face going warm, fights the urge to cover it. But more than that, she doesn’t understand. Why so much fuss over her mech? She can only assume it’s some kind of subtle way to call her a bad pilot.

Perhaps sensing her wrath, Gucci changes tactics. When she speaks again her voice is less smooth and perfect, more casual. Equally familiar. “Do you remember that summer a few years back, when we were both staying at the Chasmata estate? When you sulked for a month and refused to speak more than one word to me at a time?”

“Not really, no.” Of course, Clementine does remember. She remembers specifically because that was, in fact, the first time she had ever kissed Gucci Garantine. She remembers it with the unpleasant clarity that belongs to all unfortunate teenage memories—the nostalgic beginning of summer, the rest of the night’s events blurred, and then _that._ They had then refused to speak of it. Or rather, Gucci had never brought it up and she had refused to ask.

She’s wondering where this conversation is going when suddenly Gucci turns on her, firm and abrupt but not ungentle, and presses them together into the wall. The metal surface is hard at Clementine’s back. “What,” she manages to stammer out, and then Gucci is cutting her off calmly.

“This is your fortress, Clementine.” She says. “Nothing happens here without your knowledge, right?”

That’s hardly true, but she won’t admit that. Especially not when she wants so badly to see where this is going. “That is correct. But—”

“When will the next guards pass through here?” Gucci is adamant, pushing a little closer, her thigh pressed—don’t think about that, Clementine, focus. “Think, princess. It’s your ship.”

Clementine wracks her brain, panicked. She didn’t come here for a test, can hardly be expected to—but as she thinks about it, as she tries to calm herself, she realizes that it _is_ her ship. And she does know, because she demanded the schedules, that the shift will change at 1700 hours, and so a patrol will likely pass through a little before that. And she has a vague sense of what time it is now, so…

“Around fifteen minutes from now,” she answers, with more confidence than she really feels. Not that it matters, anyway. She just wants to pass whatever test this is.

“Fifteen minutes, then.” Gucci says with a strange finality, and kisses her.

It’s the first time she’s thought consciously about this since Gucci’s first night aboard Icebreaker. Since Clementine felt like she— _saw_ something, was _seen_ in return. Since then it’s been cordial between them through the negotiations. Until today, they’ve spoken only on behalf of their respective groups. It barely occurs to her, of course, that this may have had some bearing on her mood.

Her awareness narrows to sensation, to her body, to a new and more convenient outlet for the strange kinetic energy inside her. She kisses back ferociously. As if she could pour out her anger and frustration through her lips, through her hands at the small of Gucci’s back to drag her closer. Her body pushes up, and there is relief, her racing mind gone ever more quiet with each motion. The anger fades from her; there is only Gucci’s mouth on hers and the taste of oranges and the hum of the fortress around them.

Gucci isn’t expecting, perhaps, for her to respond with such enthusiasm. But she welcomes it with a soft contented sound, lets Clementine push and pull as she will.

Until she feels the need to take the reins. One of her hands goes to Clementine’s hair, the other to touch her through her slacks.

“Oh,” Clementine starts, snapping out of the kiss so hard she nearly slams her head against the wall.

Gucci stops, withdraws her hand. “No?”

“No, yes—I mean—yes,” Clementine fumbles uselessly for a moment, not sure what to do with her hands, her mouth. “Yes,” she manages, fervent, and thumbs the buttons undone as quickly as she can, shoves them down a few inches to afford better access. And then she’s grabbing at Gucci’s arm, her shoulder, clinging to her in a desperate attempt to stay upright.

At minute fourteen, she’s shaking, making pathetic noises where her face is pressed into Gucci’s neck. She can’t think, but wants— “Tell me—” she whines, uncontrollably, “Tell me that I’m good, I—"

Gucci’s free hand cards through her hair. “You’re doing good, princess,” she murmurs, her low voice the first strike of a match, curling smoke. “You’re so beautiful, you’re so good.” The second strike catches and burns through her, lighting up her whole body, bringing her ever closer to melting entirely. Gucci kisses her, hard, to stifle her sounds.

And then just as quickly as it started, Gucci is fixing up her buttons and pulling away, before Clementine’s brain has even had a chance to start working enough to register the sound of boots on metal.

Two of her guard come around the corner. A.O. Rooke’s men, and one of them gives her a wave as they approach. Clem raises her hand in response, dazedly, still shivering.

“So, princess,” Gucci says, too loud, deliberately conspicuous. “We do still need to address those budgetary concerns. I’d be happy to bring the documentation by your room later, if you’d like.”

“Yes. Right. Of course.” She manages, although her voice is somewhat breathier than it strictly should be. “I would be happy to look those over. You can meet me there after you’ve seen to your repairs.” And now it will be passed around her security that Gucci is invited to be there, that they shouldn’t be disturbed. She couldn’t have planned it better.

Gucci flicks her eyes up and down, pleased with her handiwork. “Perfect. I won’t be long. We have a great deal of lost time to make up for.”

And then she’s gone behind the guards, the echo of her steps and her voice caught up in the low murmur of electricity and steam and water and all that flows through Icebreaker.

Safely enclosed in her cabin, Clementine panics.

Should she wear something special? Should she do—something, anything that will guarantee her some kind of advantage? She’s never understood, really, how people go about this sort of thing. And this isn’t just _people_ , this is the only person whose opinion of her she might care ever so slightly about.

Clem throws herself back onto the bed, into the pile of cushions. Then, immediately tired of waiting, rolls over. Buries her head in a pillow and resolutely does not scream against it in frustration.

The longer she waits the less sure she is of anything. Maybe she’s misinterpreted. More likely she’s been made fun of. Or she’s lost—some game she didn’t know she was playing, failed again to live up to expectations. That feeling is rising in her again, the tense energy that builds and coils in her chest.

The knock on her door jolts her out of her thoughts, the _tap-tap-tap_ too much like a half-remembered childhood code to be anyone but Gucci. Clementine spares a moment for her hair—disastrous and still damp, but it will have to do—before she goes to the door.

She catches Gucci examining the things in her makeshift sitting room. Some of the old china and furniture is no doubt familiar, but she feels suddenly childish, to have brought all this to a fortress that will have no need of it.

“I like your set-up, here.” Gucci says, her hand running over a plush white cushion. “Very official. I can’t wait to see how you’ll decorate the palace.”

Clementine leans up against the open door in what she desperately hopes is a flattering way. “Yes, well. The future ruler of Stel Kesh shouldn’t have to receive guests in her bedroom.”

“Of course not. And yet I was hoping you would do just that.”

Having, for a moment, the upper hand, she’s not eager to relinquish it. She likes the way Gucci is looking past her things and at her. Clem shrugs a little, pretending badly at disinterest. It’s petty, she knows, but she wants to be looked at like that just a bit longer.

“Come on, princess. Or are you going to keep me waiting?” Gucci coaxes, but her face betrays her. Her sideways look, the way she bites her lip—Clementine knows her too well, and feels a slick thrill of satisfaction at the sight of Gucci Garantine losing her cool for once. And a deeper rush at knowing she’s the cause of it.

“That wouldn’t be very diplomatic of me, would it,” she says, her voice gone suddenly low and quiet.

As soon as the door clicks shut behind them (though she has no illusions about privacy here) she can’t keep her hands to herself, tugs Gucci close by her lapels. Stifles the laugh and murmured “You’re so bossy,” with her mouth.

And it’s not what she dreamed, it’s not easy, natural as breathing—but it is sweet. It’s the first decision in a long time she’s felt certain about.

The urgency falls away in the comfort of being attended to. She’s never felt more—won’t say _loved_ but _adored_ than this, with such careful attention on her. With a gentle hand stroking her face, soft and warm. With the firm press of thigh to thigh. Her bruises echo at the contact but this is better, so much better than fighting. She sighs against Gucci’s mouth, yielding to the inexorable pull of gravity. For once, Clementine is content not to be the center of the universe, feeling instead it currently lies somewhere between them.

Her body is less clumsy when she’s not trying so hard to command it and her leg moves up, instinctively, better to cling to the solid warmth of her partner’s body. Gucci makes a quiet sound against her and pushes forward, nudges her back until she hits the foot of the bed. With a hand at her lower back, Clementine lets herself be moved. Lets herself fall. Gucci goes with her, pinning her down, for a moment, like the Oblige. Only this time it doesn’t feel like a loss.

Then Gucci is easing off her and standing tall. She’s beautiful, a red flare in the night sky. It’s strange. Clementine doesn’t usually think things like that. Normally, there is only the demand: look at me, focus on me.

Now she goes quiet for once and just watches. She reclines against the pillows, watching Gucci undress. Long gloves peeled off, slowly. A ribbon undone at her neck. A smile—she’s watching Clementine watch her.

“What do you want, princess?” She asks and Clem shivers with it, with the expanse of what she wants.

But.

When Gucci says it like that, when she smiles this way…it’s clear, in the way she looks at Clementine, that this is just another game. And Clementine cannot bear anyone to look at her like that anymore, least of all her.

“Don’t call me that,” she snaps a little, turning her head sideways into the pillow so she won’t have to see the reaction. “I’m not a princess here. I will return to Kesh as _ruler_ or not at all.”

Gucci stares at her for a long moment. Then she smiles, a more genuine smile. “Then I suppose we have a way to go before I need to concern myself with following your orders.”

Well, that won’t do. “I’m still the captain of this vessel.”

“Sure.”

“Which I have so graciously allowed you and your collection of rebels aboard—”

“Alright, Clementine—”

“—so it seems only right that you make some…show of good will before we begin these negotiations properly.”

The bed dips as Gucci joins her, leans over her with all the grace of a lion. “And how might I do that?”

“Kiss me again.”

Generously, she obliges.

It has become a part of Clementine’s morning ritual to take breakfast with her team, such as they are. For the sake of camaraderie, or simply to be sure they aren’t plotting against her.

They meet in Leap’s room, usually, as it is the biggest on the ship, and even Clem is willing to lower herself a little if it means getting something from his seemingly endless supply of smuggled treats. The ship’s food is fine, but it’s ship’s food. It’s not the same.

This morning, he and Million are tossing back and forth little crackers that burst with spicy filling. Clem joins them in the middle of this, slightly out of breath.

“What’s with the look?” Millie fixes her almost immediately with a keen and dangerous expression. “Don’t you usually have your whole _pale_ thing?”

Clementine blinks at her for a moment, not understanding. Then she looks down at herself. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with her outfit. The embroidered boots pair well with crisp white wide-legged trousers, which complement the…conspicuously red silk blouse that is just a little oversized on her. Fashionably so.

“Yes, well. I’m trying something new.” She does her best to school her expression into something carefully neutral. “Now give me some of those.”

“Ask nicely!” Leap crows, and they devolve into a little chaos of grabbing and throwing. In a moment, she’ll remember who and what she is, and all but order Sovereign to intervene.

For that brief moment, though, it suits her to think of herself as nothing more than Clementine.


	2. offing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gucci helps, in her own way, and considers what she wants from the future.

The Transgress Oblige likes her best alone.

It feels strange to say that about a machine. A mass produced one at that, without even questionable sentience. It doesn’t do things like that, it doesn’t have preferences.

Yet Gucci has come to realize over the last years of piloting the Oblige that it shines best when she stands alone. When her team is elsewhere, when she’s the last to retreat, it is ready with her. She understands, of course, the necessity of her house, the value of her team. And she cares for them, of course. But there’s a freedom to these moments, when it’s just her and the mech.

And so she often does this in the recesses between the conference talks, when she wants to be alone with her thoughts, when she doesn’t want Meridian or anyone else to find her. Climbs up into the cockpit with the lights off and works as much as she can manage. She doesn’t understand much about the actual mechanics of it, but she can run through the onboard systems one by one. She can polish the interior in slow, meditative motions—such a task would be beneath her, usually, but there’s no one else she trusts with this part of the Oblige, not even Broun.

Gucci has, in many ways, been alone up until now. Surrounded by people, sure, always, but each person only ever knew one half of her. Here on Icebreaker, she’s not exactly Saint Dawn or Gucci Garantine. It’s different. Not necessarily good or bad, but different.

And then there’s Clementine. Who, apparently, has known both of her all along. That’s different, too. She’s categorized it so far as strangely welcome.

They have always enjoyed each other's company—Clementine Kesh is unquestionably a brat, but she’s keener than she seems and was ever the most interesting of their peers. There was a time, before that strange tension of the past year, that she would have considered Clementine as much of a friend as people like them can be.

Though she never would have guessed at the source of that tension. To think she was the opponent who kept Gucci up for days. Determined enough to kill a civilian without hesitation. Clever enough to keep it hidden for so long! And skilled enough to come out of that fight, and other missions besides, bloodied but unbeaten. It’s hard even now to imagine this is the same girl prone to sulking if she so much as got her hair wet. A little disconcerting that it eluded her attention, but then she’s been keeping awfully busy in both sides of her work these days.

Clementine has continued, so far, to surprise her, equal parts invigorating and infuriating. Some part of her wants them to never be in full agreement. Just as having Clem to compete against always did make her better at their idle games, the thought of that unnamed enemy drove her to train harder, to investigate more thoroughly. The people deserved to know the truth of Past, sure, but she can’t say for certain she would have gone to such lengths to get it if her more personal needs hadn’t been at stake.

She has seen the military heroes and diplomats of House Brightline grow complacent, no longer caring for justice. And she knows, as surely as she knows anything, that as long as Clementine is around that will never be her. She will always have a target to aim for. Or at. Doesn’t much matter which.

The onboard clock chimes at her, a ringing glass sound, reminding her that diplomacy beckons again. Gucci stands and stretches, arms over her head, brushing a palm across the low ceiling. She catches her reflection as she leaves. She looks good: noble, confident. Could use a little more red.

The thing about diplomacy is that it’s often incredibly boring. This, of course, is half the reason Gucci took up arms in the first place. There are some things that simply can’t get done in a meeting room, plenty more that could if people would only stop dragging it out.

Today it’s war that they keep coming back to, and what their role in it should be. It’s not surprising, of course, that given their membership there should be people with a strong opinion on who the True Princept of All Divinity is. Well-bred instinctive loyalty tells her it’s Cynosure Whitestar-Kesh, obviously, but there’s no reason she should remain attached to that statement. It’s not like it’s ever particularly mattered to her more than that, but especially now that she knows all this violence has erupted from a lie. Whenever she thinks about it she just sees Past on that footage again, the great shimmering bulk of it angling towards death.

"The war needs to stop, regardless.” When Gucci stands, scarlet half-cape cascading down her shoulders, the room goes still and quiet. Good. She has honed the skills of oration and social graces, knows how to make her voice ring a little clearer, how to seem a little taller. How to make unpleasant truths palatable. But neither are her charms lost on the more common members of their conference, who know her as a proven commander. “Innocent people bear the worst of it.” It’s a nice, simple line, something no one in this room will be able to disagree with.

“Though,” she adds, “for the record: Cynosure would be easier for us to influence. He may benefit more from the established order of things, but he lacks any real conviction. He is a perfect mouthpiece for Kesh now, we would simply be changing the voice.” She doesn’t blink, doesn’t look to the side, but she certainly notices Clementine’s stifled little laugh at that. They would have phrased it less politely between themselves, but the sentiment remains.

Gur Sevraq clears their throat, bringing everyone’s attention back together. “Saint Dawn is correct. We should not lose sight of those most affected by this war.” Gucci gives him a little _thank-you_ nod as she sits.

The air of civility should hold for a while. Gucci’s been pleasantly surprised, so far, at how well these people are able to behave. Bored again, she turns to a favorite easy pastime: watching Clementine across the room from her. It’s always entertaining—Clementine hasn’t learned to control her emotions at all, and clearly shows it on her face whenever she wishes she could shut someone up. Today she’s leaning back in her seat, arms crossed and tense. Wearing a flight jacket embroidered in white, a parody of military fashion.

And sometime in the half-day since they’ve last seen each other, she’s cut her hair short. It hangs just under her chin, the choppy strands starting to curl haphazardly around her face. Surely, Gucci thinks, she wouldn’t do it herself. But it really, really looks as though she has.

Clementine’s hair has been long and blonde as her mother’s for as long as they’ve known each other. Though she’s seen beautiful oil portraits, among the family’s many, of Crysanth in a different age, her hair short and severe and elegant. She wonders, not for the first time, if Clementine is trying to defy her mother or become her.

Neither seems to be working out particularly well so far, but she looks good. Surprisingly good, really—It makes her look a little older, and, thankfully, not really anything like Crysanth. That’s probably for the best. The world Horizon is fighting for has no room for another Crysanth Kesh.

Clem rubs the back of her neck, toying with the freshly cut hair in an unconscious, nervous gesture. It’s a dead giveaway that she’s going to speak. And Gucci is careful not to lean in at all but she is curious, really, as to how she plans to handle this.

When Clementine stands it’s all at once, a sharp and derailing motion. The conversation stops for her less out of respect and more a sense of dread.

“We don’t need to throw in with either side, we stand on our own. But if we are to enter negotiations with anyone, it should be Dahlia.” The tone she’s using is a new one, neither hesitant nor the cold imperiousness learned from her mother. This is the commander of the Rapid Evening in her best moments: pointing in a clear direction and leaving no room for argument. “I will be the first to say I don’t agree with their efforts, but their goals are far more closely aligned with our own. And though it pains me as a daughter of Stel Kesh to admit it, they wield vastly more influence. People love them. They will love us, too.”

“And if an alliance should fail, well. They’d make an excellent hostage. I imagine their sibling would do nearly anything to be assured of their safety.” She throws the last bit out with a shrug before she sits down. An afterthought.

It becomes immediately clear that several of their company disagree, but Gucci is to a certain degree impressed with her pragmatism. She wonders, yet again, when the little princess had grown up. Had she simply blinked and missed it? Or had it slipped past her a hundred small times, when she was busy thinking about her next action?

The session ends with nothing decided, as usual. Gucci doesn’t mind it for now, the philosophical nature of the whole thing, but sooner or later there are going to be choices made. If no one else intends to make them, she will; if they are too halting to move into action she will do that too.

She sidles up to Clem as they’re all leaving, matches her pace. Allows their arms to brush together just slightly. “I was intrigued by your position,” she murmurs close in her ear. “Though—are you sure you’re not just looking for a fight with Lucia Whitestar?”

Clem _laughs_ at that, taken off guard. When she tilts her head back to Gucci she looks—tired from the day, but pleased. Smirking. It’s nice. It’s been a while since she seemed this confident. “If I have any luck at all, Lucia Whitestar has saved me the trouble and gotten herself killed already.”

“Here’s hoping.” There’s something pleasantly familiar about it all. Like old gossip, even if the stakes are now much higher.

She’s surprisingly loathe to part ways when they reach her room. And so she doesn’t pull away when Clem reaches for her wrist, a grazing touch that is clearly supposed to be seductive but really only reads as hesitant. “Meet me for a drink later? I’ll be up on the flight deck.”

Gucci smiles. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

The sun sets red over the Prophet’s Sea, staining the dark water with the color of war. It spreads out, abyssal black and endless until it meets that bright red line of the horizon. Gucci allows herself a moment to enjoy the grand symbolism of it.

It’s beautiful. After two weeks at sea, she’s still not used to it. Both sides of her work have taken her all across Partizan, but few have ever had the privilege of standing in the center of the world like this, held aloft only by the hope and hard work of everyone aboard this vessel. From this perspective, it truly feels like they might shift the very foundation of this moon.

Maybe this is how the Prophet felt, she thinks, a little ironically. For all her aims she has never had that sort of aspiration. Gucci Garantine doesn’t need to rule the Principality. But _Saint Dawn_ will be the name on people’s lips when they wish for help. Which is a little like the Prophet, in the end.

She finds Clementine already up on the flight deck, sitting with a glass in her hand. She’s traded her usual champagne for wine. By now, work has started up again. Under the cover of night, a few mechs are at work on the deck, sorting cargo, preparing the space to be used for launching once more. Their little red lights blinking in the dark. The two of them are small in comparison. It reminds her, funnily, of parties at the Winter Palace—sneaking out, knowing they would be undisturbed in the gardens at night.

“Tired of the party?” She calls across the deck.

Clem laughs a little, motions for her to come sit. “Yes, well. It’s so hard to find privacy these days.”

Oh, so that’s her angle. It’s not necessarily how she imagined her evening going, but Gucci is definitely not opposed to the idea of relieving some stress. Clementine leans over her as soon as she sits down, carefully painted lips finding her own. They’ve gotten better at meeting each other halfway.

The kiss becomes something open-mouthed and easy, leisurely. And why not? That’s been her prevailing sentiment toward their relationship these last few weeks. Why not kiss her pliant? Why not slide a hand up her thigh? Why not have a little fun while they’re here, why not start a new kind of game between them since the old one’s come to such a strange conclusion? There’s something satisfying to her about the way they’ve come full circle. The bold and noble hero gets the girl, even if not exactly the kind of girl she imagined.

By the time they pull away, Clem’s cheeks are so red they seem to glow a little in the setting sun. She looks better like this, Gucci thinks, hair mussed by the wind blowing off the sea. A little closer to the anonymous figure on the battlefield.

Clementine takes an ungraceful swallow of her wine, perhaps for courage. “So.” Her eyes glitter. “You found my performance today impressive?”

Right, that’s the reason why not. She’s this close to laughing at the bare hunger for approval. Sometimes there’s a part of Gucci that just wants to grab her by the shoulders and say _listen, no matter what you do your mother is not going to love you, so you should just do what you want_.

But she’s also aware that the desire for approval is the only thing that keeps her mostly in check. Leverage it here and there and she might end up a very convenient ruler. “Let’s say fascinating instead.” She says smoothly. If Clem wants to talk politics while sitting in her lap, she’s all too happy to oblige. “I’m curious, though--if you did commit to Dahlia’s side. How would we ensure Kesh stays in our hands?”

“I don’t intend to give them much choice.” Clem graciously ignores the _our_ , more graciously than is at all typical of her. So maybe their extracurricular activities have had an unexpected benefit after all.

It’s not as if that’s been her angle, though the idea has crossed her mind. Sure, the idea of being the real power behind a throne sounds nice, but royal consort has never been the future she imagined for herself. And Clementine Kesh is a different sort of project. Something a little closer to humanitarian aid. No, she likes Clementine, really she does. Just not so much that she’s willing to be distracted. At least not in the way Clementine is.

“You know, it’s possible the reason Horizon is so much more effective than your little squad is because we make actual plans.” She’s only half-teasing. Apparently that half is mean enough to make Clementine slide off her lap in a huff.

Gucci shivers from the sudden lack of body heat. As the sun has dropped lower the temperature has gone with it, the wind blowing frigid off the sea. Clem pulls her jacket around her a little tighter. “Well, you can handle it, then. How would you like to be a general?” She takes a little sip of her wine to punctuate.

How very typical it is. Why bother taking responsibility when you can delegate it to someone else? And while general does sound significantly better than consort, she’ll have no trouble getting that promotion on her own. “Clementine.” She chides, as gently as she can manage. “You’ll have to think about these things as a ruler.”

Clem glares at her, petulant. Even in the dark, Gucci knows that face too well, the same one she’s always made. “Why should I? You think about them enough. Sovereign thinks about them.”

“So you want to be a figurehead, not a ruler. You should have said that to begin with.” It comes out harsher than she means, but it’s for her own good, really. “Besides, your Sovereign Immunity betrayed your house once already. I would not have you pin all your hopes on him.”

The scowl drops from her face then, replaced, for a moment, by something colder. Something sharper. “And what exactly have you done for my house? Save for use our money to fund a terrorist operation?”

There’s plenty of answers she could give, a million ways she could roll over and bare her throat if she wanted, but she’s not sure which one would even satisfy this side of Clementine that sounds just slightly like her mother. “That terrorist operation is part of your cause now, in case you forgot.”

“For now. But let’s not lie to each other.” Clementine stands, cupping her wine glass in one hand, shivering a little in the wind.

 _And why not?_ Gucci thinks, a little bitterly. It’s not as if they’ve been particularly honest with each other up to this point. It’s that hypocrisy that needles at her. She’s at a loss as to where exactly she mis-stepped in this conversation, but she is sick of trying to be diplomatic when it’s so clearly not wanted.

Well. She knows better than most that sometimes when Clem is being difficult what she needs is a firm hand.

“Clementine, if what you want is vapid affection you can easily find someone else.” She calls, cold, freezes her in her tracks. Good.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” Gucci does not snap, does not yell. She’s above that. But neither does she even bother trying to hold back her disdain. “If you need my help I am more than happy to give it. But if you want someone to hold your hand and tell you what a good job you’ve done…that is not help. That is indulgence.”

“What—I don’t--" Clementine spends a moment at a loss before she catches hold of herself, her panicked look quickly turning furious. “As I recall, it was you who started this.”

And how she regrets it right now. “That’s fair. But these are my terms. if you’re not interested anymore, I understand.”

Clem makes a high noise in her throat, a near growl of frustration. The countdown to full tantrum ticking down. “I mean, Gucci—I didn’t say that, I just—” She breathes in sharp and deep, in-out, years of trite lessons on composure playing out across her face. “I’ll ask for your help when I want it. And right now I do not.”

It’s almost a diplomatic response. Unfortunately, she values herself too much to be a part of another Clementine Kesh grand ego trip. “I’m not going to wait around to be called upon. I’m a busy person. I won’t sleep at the foot of your bed.”

For a moment, there’s no response. But even at this distance, Gucci can tell—she’s borderline incandescent with rage.

The angry scream she’s waiting for doesn’t come. “Alright.” Clementine says, her voice flat and bitter. And before they can say anything else, she turns and stalks back into the heart of Icebreaker.

Well, then. Gucci thinks, leaning back in the space she left. Maybe that’s that.

There’s an unpleasant sort of emptiness, though, to the idea of that being that, unpleasant mostly in the fact that she’s feeling something about it at all. Clementine was not supposed to be a distraction. It doesn’t sit well with her, the thought that she is capable of being so distracted.

It’s properly cold now, the sun gone aside from one red line on the horizon. But for some reason she can’t quite bring herself to move. If she stands and follows, she might end up doing something unwise. So instead she watches the mandated constellations take their place in the night sky. The sphinx, as always, commands attention.

The following week is, as she might have predicted, strange and unpleasant. They’re back to only the most cordial interactions. Though even that is a sort of relief (at least diplomacy has not broken down completely,) Gucci has to admit to herself, very unpleasantly, that she misses their friendship.

Or whatever it was.

She misses having someone to smirk across the room at during the most inane speeches. More than that, she misses having someone to—well, to show off to. To beat in a near daily sparring match. To share a drink with. To cut loose with in other ways as well, sure. At least she has work to keep her busy, plenty of it, real and important work. The things she should not have let herself be distracted from.

But she doesn’t miss the glances that Clementine has been throwing her way. In the meantime, Gucci makes her own moves. Horizon doesn’t need anyone else’s approval to continue their work. And she takes the liberty of establishing a command deck of her own, for reasons that are purely practical and have nothing at all to do with pettiness. Really, she tells herself, it’s better that she know now that she can’t rely on Clem’s support rather than realizing it later. She can go about her business knowing that she’s not going to break first.

As it turns out, she’s right. It takes eight days for the awkwardness—or perhaps, she thinks uncharitably, the lack of attention—to become too much for Clementine to bear.

It happens not at all like she was expecting. What she’s expecting is for Clem to all but attack her again, to insist on fighting or fucking it out of her system until she feels—better, or worse, or whatever. Instead, conciliation comes with a soft knock on her door. A pattern that she knows well.

“Come in,” Gucci calls, imperious where she’s lounging on her bed. Not everyone got to bring their things here from a palace, but she’s done her best with the space, transformed what might have once been some sort of officer’s room into a little sanctuary draped with rich reds.

Clementine’s face peeks through the half-open door. It’s a pleasant reversal of their positions, Clem coming to her. Clearly, she’s not enjoying it nearly as much. She looks like she’s bitten into a lemon.

“I was wondering,” Clem starts, then falters. “I thought maybe—”

Gucci merely raises an eyebrow. She’s not going to help her out. Let her grovel a little, it may do her some good.

“Do-you-want-to-go-rowing-with-me?” spills out of her in one breath, so quick that it’s hard to understand what she’s said.

“Rowing.” Clementine confirms with a curt little nod. “In the ocean?”

“Yes, well. Sailing, maybe. What have you. I told them to prepare a boat.” She can’t help but laugh a little at that, making Clem bristle like a cat trying to make itself look bigger. “I’m serious. I thought perhaps you could use the…privacy. A break.”

“You mean you thought _you_ could.”

“Well, of course I could. And now I am offering it to you additionally. I don’t know why you always have to be so infuriating—"

“Yes.”

Clementine stares at her for a moment like she doesn’t know the word. Her shoulders relax infinitesimally with relief.

“Of course I’ll come.” She barely resists the urge to add _and you like it when I’m infuriating._ That would likely be pushing it, and she would hate to crush this new peace before it even begins.

Even calm, the Prophet’s Sea is a powerful thing, pushing them from side to side on their course around Icebreaker. It’s easy to forget from the inside just how big the thing is. And just how alone it is in the ocean. She'll have to ask, eventually, why Clementine so likes to insist upon meeting under the open air.

There's no plan to their movements aside from going until they get tired, which is just fine with Gucci. It’s nice. The burn in her arms, in her core, is completely different from piloting a mech. It’s been too long since she did something like this with her body alone. But not so long that they can’t find each other’s rhythm again easily. A few moments of fumbling and then they’re moving in tandem without having to say a word, smooth, even strokes that feel easier than speaking to each other.

Enjoying the strain, Gucci pushes herself, putting a little more force into each sweep of the oars. Clem quickly adjusts to her pace. It comes easy, familiar, the knowledge of one too many summers spent like this.

Their silence moves between comfortable and heavy, punctuated the sound of oars hitting water, of the waves rocking their boat. Clementine glances up at the shadow of the fortress fondly. As if Icebreaker Prime were some nice antique she’d picked up at auction.

She looks thoroughly pleased with herself even as she strains against the water, dressed in white and blue to match their boat. A faux-military thing presumably intended to make her look like a naval commander. It’s almost Apostolisian, a style that would have been delightfully edgy back in Cruciat but in this context comes off as a little pathetic. It looks good on her, though, so Gucci chooses not to bring it up. Playing commander looks good on her, as a whole.

Only it’s not playing now, is it, not exactly. What she’s done here is as real as anything. The barest hint of guilt creeps up—maybe she hasn’t been giving her enough credit.

It’s just that she knows all too well. Like all of their status, a bored and listless Clem will accomplish less than nothing. Challenge her, though, push her buttons, and every once in a while she’ll surprise you. So Gucci decides to push again. If not for the sake of her friend, then for the sake of their revolution.

But then they come out of the shadow of Icebreaker for a moment and into the sun. It catches on the sea just right, dazzling. Catches on Clem’s face, too, and the guileless, contented expression she would never show to anyone else. She’s sweating a little with the work of it, with the heat, and her face will be at least a little burnt later. Like it has been every summer since they were young. And it will be terribly charming.

She’ll have another opportunity eventually, Gucci decides. It can wait.

A few hours later they clamber up the dock like children again, her dress dripping with saltwater. She expects them to part ways, then, but Clem follows her back to her room without saying anything. Which is fine. Presumptuous, maybe, but when is she not.

It’s not like there’s anyone here who would scold them, but it still feels a little like old times, sneaking through the palace. Yet when she shuts her cabin door there’s none of the excitement she was expecting. Clementine is still quiet, oddly subdued, only muttering what might be a thank you as Gucci offers her a towel.

It strikes her then that maybe this really is her attempt at apologizing. Maybe this is what a _sorry_ Clem looks like—so confused at the feeling she can’t even speak.

Well, if she let it bother her every time Clementine was acting weird she’d never get anything done and she’s sick of standing around in wet clothes. Determined to ignore her, Gucci turns away and starts undoing the clasps of her dress. And that is enough, apparently, to motivate her into action.

“I can help.” She says, suddenly, echoed by the soft sound of the towel being thrown aside.

“Sure.” Gucci tilts her neck, lets the fabric slide down a little and drape off her shoulder. “Come here.”

She doesn’t have to turn to know that Clem is right behind her, familiar shape fitting into her shadow. Her fingers fumble with the clasp for a moment before she’s sliding it loose and easing the dress down Gucci’s back. Her hands are soft in only the way someone who’s never worked a day in their life can be. They shake a little as she follows the fabric down, over ribs, over hips.

When she turns, Clementine is so close she can see the freckles starting to bloom on her face.

Her expectations are challenged yet again, as Clem doesn’t attempt to kiss her or otherwise gain the upper hand. Instead she waits until the dress has fallen to the floor. And she drops with it. On her knees in a circle of red. The attempt at bribery is amusingly obvious, but that doesn’t make it look any less good.

They slow, then, as she loses whatever boldness briefly possessed her. Gucci is magnanimous enough to help her out, slides out of the rest of her clothes and braces her leg against Clem’s shoulder.

It’s different, now, running her fingers through shorter hair still damp from the sea. But nice, the way she can curl her fingers in close to the base of her scalp and watch her shiver. “It’s okay if you’re nervous.”

Clem glares up at her, that fire of challenge in her eyes again, her brow furrowed in that familiar way. Her face flushed with anger and something else. Her hair is scattered from the wind and water, stray strands sticking to her face. It’s the most beautiful she’s ever been and she knows, no matter how they end up, that look is going to remain in her memory.

“I’m not nervous.” She insists, the words muffled against Gucci’s thigh.

She drags her nails up and down. Somewhere between petting and pulling. “Alright. You’re not nervous, of course.”

“I’m not.” Clem repeats, distantly, the pink of her tongue poking out to wet her lips. And then—

Gucci’s hand tightens to a fist, her other hand going to Clem’s shoulder to steady herself. Like in their boat. The waves lapping at her until her body relaxes and just floats.

She allows Clementine to paint her nails later, laying on the floor of her room like they’re teenagers again. Or, allows is a strong word, really, even in her strange attempt at an apology Clem is unfailingly bossy now that she’s gotten her voice back. It makes her both very fond and uncomfortably aware of just how much she missed this—not just in the past week, but the whole past year.

She’s intensely concentrated, brow creased up in focus at the tiny lines she’s painting. Perched there like a little sphinx, not caring that she’s getting drops of glittering white polish on the bare floor. Who should care? It’s her fortress, after all. “Hold still,” she commands, gravely and utterly serious, pinning Gucci’s hand between thumb and forefinger.

It’s funny watching Clementine be her version of contrite, but she’s let it go on too long. “Is this you deciding that you want my help?” She asks, casual, leaning back on her free hand, already dried crisp and clean.

Clementine jerks her hand so violently she goes off course. “Why do you always have to do that?” She snaps, pointing the little brush in a very accusatory way. “Everyone is always--testing me but you, Gucci, I hoped you at least would know when to leave me alone.”

“You know this is nothing compared to actually ruling, right?” Ugh, it’s all over her fingers. What a brat. Gucci reaches over and rubs a little off on her arm before she can say anything about it. “People are going to be asking you difficult questions and judging you _all the time_! That’s half the job of diplomacy! I’d like to at least prepare you a little for that.” It comes out more intense, more genuine than she meant to be, but this really isn’t a game.

Clem stares at her for a second, trying to make sense of her words. As if that’s the first time anyone’s mentioned the idea to her. It’s unbefitting of her status and reputation, the quiet way she asks, “You really think I can do it?”

The strange, surprised look on Clem’s face kills her voice in her throat. She could say, _Clementine, it is absolutely insane that was the message you got out of this_. She could say, _frankly you are lucky to have gotten this far_. She could say, _even if you made it to the throne you’d be assassinated within the fucking week._

“I think you can,” Gucci says, and realizes that she means it. “But not alone.”

She makes a little _hm_ noise in the back of her throat and looks away. Like everything they’d just done was perfectly fine, but now she can’t meet Gucci’s eyes.

“The Divine Future showed me a vision, when we first met. I saw myself on the throne. I don’t know if you’ve ever met a Divine, Gucci, but…” she sighs a little. It’s not entirely rare to see Clem at a loss for words, but not like this, never so contemplative. Neither of them have ever been particularly faithful beyond the usual gestures required by their house.

She never has met a Divine up close but if she had she might feel the barest echo of that kind of presence here, in the way Clem’s eyes light when she talks. Not bright and eager, but something more distant. “It showed me this again, the night we took Icebreaker, only this time you were there. And I didn’t understand why but it was so easy between us. Like the old days, the really old days, before either of us came to this stupid moon. It felt so natural that you were there.”

The way she says that is a little too much. The games and tantrums, the familiar patterns of years, she can handle. The new, rare earnestness she doesn’t know what to do with. It makes her feel uncertain—about herself, and Clementine, and their positions in the fixed map of stars.

So she says something she is, at least, absolutely certain of. “Well, now I know it’s not coming true.”

Clem snaps instantly back to center, anger already blazing. “You’d hate it if things were that easy between us.” Gucci explains, simply. “You’d be terribly bored.”

The anger goes out in a flash, a candle blown out and gone instantly cold. It’s not fair—when she gets that strange look Gucci feels the absurd urge to lean over and kiss her forehead.

She doesn’t. The moment dissolves and Clementine looks down again, back to her task. “Maybe you’re right.” Their fingers brush as she adds another stroke of shimmering white.

“When am I not?” Gucci reaches lazily out, lets their fingers lace together. Her hands are steadier than before.


	3. damask

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clementine contends with a field trip, a bed, and her own total lack of self awareness.

It’s not that she’s chasing after Gucci. That would be ridiculous and besides, Clementine Kesh does not follow, she leads.

It’s not that she has nothing better to do. She just happens to prefer to think out in the open air. The flight deck isn’t their usual place, really, it’s hers. Hers like all the fortress is hers, even as activity now swings into full gear as the weeks drag on. She’s not the only one who’s tired of sitting still.

So it’s not that she’s looking for it, just that she happens to see the Transgress Oblige up on the deck instead of in its usual place in the repair bay. And she’s just curious, really, what exactly is happening on her own fortress without her permission.

“It’s routine.” Gucci sighs, like she’s irritated at the fact she has to explain at all, at being caught in the act. She’s suited up already in her full regalia, giving the mech a final look before launch. “Making sure a few refugees aren’t being followed. We probably won’t even see combat.”

And oh, doesn’t she sound so disappointed about that. “You could have asked first.”

“I fail to see how it’s your business. While we appreciate your hospitality, Horizon is under our own jurisdiction. There’s no reason we can’t come and go on our own terms.”

Technically, it’s true, and she was expecting to come up on something like this eventually. Just not, well, not with Gucci of all people. Of course she can come and go as she wishes, but why would she need to? Without telling Clementine?

“You could have asked first,” she snaps, crossing her arms over her chest, “as my _friend._ ”

With old familiarity she can see it played out in a matter of seconds—Gucci processing that new information, filing it away in some mental binder labeled _Clementine Kesh Pros and Cons_ , adjusting her response accordingly. An “oh,” a blink, a return to the usual graceful smile. “You’re welcome to come along, if you’re bored here. I could use someone else on comms.”

Clementine pretends to think about it for a few seconds. “Well, if you’d like.”

“You should get in, then.” Gucci calls, her voice muffled from being halfway inside the Oblige. “We’re about to launch.”

She blinks. No, she thinks, she can’t be serious. It’s just hard to hear the sarcasm. She’s going to laugh and then Clem is going to go suit up and get in her mech which is perfectly capable of flying on its own.

It’s a little uncanny how well Gucci can read her mind, pulling herself back out of the cockpit for the full effect of looking unimpressed. “You can’t take the Panther, obviously. You’ll be noticed. Think about it.”

She starts to open her mouth, finds herself lacking a response. The bad part is that she’s right. It’s one of a kind. The second anyone sees it, they’ll know Clementine Kesh is very much alive. And fighting alongside a terrorist organization. Not for the first time, she feels a surge of anger at herself of a year ago. How stupid, to think a famous war hero mech that she can’t even pilot was such a necessity--

Gucci’s expression softens into a condescending sort of pity. “You could always ride with the ground crew.”

She can feel her nose wrinkle up at the thought. “No, absolutely not.” There’s really no other option. It’s hard to explain why she doesn’t like the idea. Being stuck in close quarters with Gucci remains uncomfortable, sure, but also often thrilling. Maybe it’s just the way she associates the inside of that thing with panic and humiliation. But going back to her room and spending the rest of the day bored and alone is much worse.

“Come on, then.” Gucci extends a hand to help her up. She swallows her pride and takes it, and with that climbs into the cockpit of the Transgress Oblige.

It’s beautiful. Dazzlingly so, and she has to swallow the little gasp of awe at it. The whole inside is crystalline, like it were made from a million shattered mirrors—but they don’t mirror exactly, they’re translucent and wavering, like liquid glass, a shimmering mirage. She stares, resolutely, at the controls, avoids any surface that might reflect her face.

Gucci is, of course, used to it, and drops her hand to go settle into the pilot seat. Which leaves Clem slightly at a loss, as there is no other chair. And she’s not going to sit on the floor—she has _some_ dignity left, thank you very much, but that doesn’t exactly leave her with many options.

The Oblige shakes as it stands, engines kicking in, and she stumbles a little to keep her balance. Gucci shoots her a look she can’t decipher. “Clementine. Come here.”

For one horrifying moment she thinks that Gucci is going to have her sit on her _lap_ and Clementine really, really doesn’t want to unravel the knot of feeling that gives her. But she just shifts over on the seat, making room for Clementine to join her.

It’s not comfortable. The weird, crystalline edges are digging in at odd angles and her legs hang mostly off the side of the seat. And on her other side their bodies press too close together, a reminder that she can’t tune out. There’s something else, too, a sort of weight that isn’t exactly physical. It feels a little like Future’s presence, the full clarity of it, but anxious rather than invigorating. As if the mech itself doesn’t like having two people in it. Which is silly—the Oblige is a nightmare but it’s not a Divine, and she’s too old to believe in stories about ghosts in machines.

“Feel free to hold on if you need to,” Gucci says, and before Clem can question why in the world she would need to do that the Oblige takes off.

She knew this thing was faster than the Panther, but the jolt and pressure as it flies forward takes her completely off guard. Her whole body tenses up, gripping the chair for dear life. She can’t help but notice there’s no security system, at least none that takes control automatically.

The glass-like interior doesn’t unfold so much as peel away, leaving little gaps where the outside world can show through, missing fragments of a mirror. Clementine has never seen it from this angle, the Prophet’s Sea all spread out before them in shades of blue and green. The water and sky reflect off the mirrors, back on each other a thousand times, filling the cockpit with wavering blue light.

Gucci doesn’t react, just keeps her eyes on the horizon as she takes them low and fast, nearly skimming the water. Is this what she always sees? Flying the Panther is nothing like this. It’s red blaring lights, it’s Clementine feeling like she’s fighting the machine every step of the way. Not this easy glide. Not this freedom and sense of lightness. Gucci doesn’t seem like she’s fighting anything. Her shoulders are back, relaxed even as she’s only half-steady on the pilot seat. Her body moves only slightly, a lean that makes their shoulders brush together, not pushing the machine but moving with it. She makes it look so easy. Elegant, even now, her face tilted forward in focus. She hasn’t once looked at Clementine since they took off.

Watching Gucci pilot feels a bit like spying, even though she’s invited to be here. Clem averts her gaze. For a second, she catches a glimpse of herself in the Oblige’s walls. But it’s wavering, distorted, and it fades away into the water.

They make good time, hitting the mainland while the sun is still high. The ground team are one step ahead of them, and so they arrive at an old warehouse on the outskirts of Resevi to see Thetonious and Meridian—see, she knows their names now—preparing radar equipment.

And at that point, apparently, she is no longer important. There’s a little jolt of—not envy but annoyance, really, at how quickly they all work. The core team of Horizon, at least, is a well-oiled machine. Everyone knows their place. They follow Gucci’s orders without question. She feels like an extra piece of furniture, sitting by their radio.

It is, from what she can gather, a fairly routine mission for Horizon. Fighting has spilled over the border to the east, a convoy of refugees want an escort as they attempt to move out towards the fishing villages. Really, she doesn’t see why it’s warranted. She gets the sense that Gucci is here more to inspire confidence and look good than do any real protecting. If they’re really just refugees, there’s no reason why Kesh soldiers would chase them down.

The air is humid even indoors, everything unpleasantly sticky. Clem thinks of cool marble, of the winter palace. It’s not like this requires much thought. A second radio crackles on every so often, broadcasting anything they pick up, and she calls in if they ever happen to hear anything important. They’ve got radar and a map, too, an unpleasantly bulky thing carried over on the boat, but it does in theory give them a good view of enemy positions. If there were any enemy positions. Instead it’s her staring listlessly at the crude little diagram of trees and rocks. She could be doing a million more useful things on Icebreaker right now.

The hours start to drag on, trailing into the afternoon. Thetonious is nice, far more reasonable than any of her team, and they’ll yell back and forth with her from their guard post outside. But they won’t tell her any good stories about their time in Gucci’s service so there’s no real point to them. Clementine slumps over in her seat. Someone on the radio is saying something about needing a distraction and ugh, she couldn’t agree more.

“Saint Dawn,” she calls into the microphone, and isn’t it a bit fun to use their callsigns? “Watch your left side. I have one unit far to the northeast.” It’s almost certainly nothing, but the only redeeming thing about this whole boring venture is Gucci’s voice in her ear. Calling back: “Understood.”

The sound of glass shattering interrupts her train of thought.

It’s such a strange sound, she thinks, for a battlefield. At first it only registers as a servant dropping china, a champagne flute going to bits on a marble floor. The sound of it rings in her ear like a gunshot and keeps ringing, ringing—

No, it is a gunshot. Someone’s been shot. Clementine snaps back to herself, her body engaged.

In the stories, people always talk about time slowing on the battlefield, about the preternatural awareness that would always hit in the worst moments.

In Clementine’s experience, it has always seemed to move faster.

Many things happen at once. “Come in, Saint Dawn!” she’s demanding, over and over. “Are you hurt?” And the little dot on the map is still moving, moving and fuck, she hears the thudding sound of another shot going wide.

“We’ve taken a hit, but I’m uninjured.” Gucci calls back, and her voice is steady but Clem can hear the tension, the anger in it. “Good call.”

The praise doesn’t even register, that’s how keyed up she is. All she can really process is the voice on the enemy line is laughing, muffled. The loud, mechanical click of a massive rifle being loaded once more. She realizes with a dim sort of horror that these are Kesh soldiers, scouting out beyond the main line. And they don’t even know who they’re shooting at.

Certainly this is beyond the scope of their orders. Not that it matters. The war’s a petty fiction compared to everything else going on. “I’m going to give you an angle for return fire.”

A crunching noise, the muffled sound of Gucci swearing. “It hit my fucking gun.”

“Then you need to fall back.” She orders through clenched teeth. If she were only home. She’d have them court martialed, no, executed.

There’s the sound of gunfire, too close. “Absolutely not. I’m not leaving these people to die.”

“I don’t care—” Clementine snaps, leaning into the microphone, “I don’t care if they die, I’m giving you an order! Fall back!”

“You’re not my commander,” Gucci replies, more calm than anyone being shot at should sound. “And if you say that again I will cut comms.”

Clementine pulls away from the radio to put a hand over her mouth and scream in frustration.

It feels like being in her hospital bed again. Unable to do anything. Knowing, seeing that the world was moving but being utterly unable to touch it. To do anything about it. And then before she can stop herself she imagines it: Gucci in her place, laying still, too still—

“—Clem, it’s okay if you can’t—"

Fine. Fine, she can do this. She’s an incredibly successful leader. She’s a tactical genius and Gucci is the best fighter she knows. This is a single pathetic Kesh sniper out of line. This is nothing.

Clementine takes one deep breath, lets it go. “Fine. We close and destroy. How’s your mobility?”

“They hit a wing, but I can run.” There’s no lack of confidence in her tone, but plenty of irritation. Gucci is always so precious about that mech. She can hear it ring as it tries to move, the sound of windchimes being smashed together. “How far away am I?”

“It’s not good.” The lone dot of the enemy is on the very edge of what she can pick up, and not much cover in between. “Can you do the, the trick you always pull on me?” She’s not sure exactly how it works, even having been inside that thing.

“Obviously--” Another shot lands nearby with a horrible crash, roaring in her ears. “--don’t know how long that gives me, though. It doesn’t exactly have the same effect on most people.”

She chooses to ignore that. “You don’t need to close completely. Can’t you throw those spears?”

Even through the tinny speakers, she catches Gucci’s pleased little laugh. “I can if you give me a decent angle. Get ready.”

Decent, ha. She’s about to ask how the hell she should get ready when she can’t even see what’s going on.

But then she hears the satisfying click of plates sliding away, into place. The person on the enemy line shouts like they’ve been flashbanged, and in a way they certainly have. She can imagine how dazzling it must be in the open air, the sun reflecting from every angle. An eye looking through the scope of a rifle and seeing only itself fragmented--

“Closing. Where?”

Her brain and eyes scramble, trying to read the little lights. This would be so much easier if she were out there. If she could see the space, mark targets, physically do anything. Other people are supposed to do this kind of work, people who are not heroes. “Thirty from your position.” She tries, but they’re moving too fast. “No, forty.”

The worst part about it is that she can’t tell, really, what’s going on. All she has to go by are the little blinking lights in front of her, the sudden bangs or scraping metal sounds that ring in her ears. It could be anything. She tries to picture it, only ends up seeing Gucci in a hospital bed again.

And then there’s the horribly familiar shriek of one of the Oblige’s partisans piercing a mechanical body. It sounds different from here, different when she’s not the one in the mech, but there’s no mistaking it for anything else. Someone has almost certainly died. So she knows what the call will be before Gucci comes over the line.

“Done. Your angle was a little off.” She sounds winded, but satisfied, breathing hard.

To her credit, she doesn’t immediately tell Gucci to fuck off. But with no immediate enemy, there’s nothing to distract her from her steadily simmering anger. “You’re clear. Proceed to rendezvous point.” She doesn’t wait for a response. Just throws the headset down with a clatter and stalks out of the building.

Thetonious is sitting by the door, cleaning a gun. They give her a look as she emerges—obviously, they could hear all of that—but they don’t say anything to stop her.

Outside isn’t much better, humid and hot in the peak of the day. The dirt road that leads back towards the little hovel they’re calling a town stretches out, shimmering in the heat. Nothing else out here but the plants. No gunfire in the distance, no sounds of glass. She just needs—air, not to be sitting still, something. Without meaning to she starts tracing the width of the little dirt road, back and forth. A one-two-three count, a step remembered from years ago dance lessons before her mother realized she was shit at that, too.

“Hey, you don’t have to be so tense.” Tone says, carefully, watching the furrow she’s grinding in the dirt. “We’ve been doing this a long time. She can handle herself, I promise.”

“I’m well aware.” Clementine snaps, and they leave it be.

She keeps pacing, digging the heel of her boot pettily into the dirt and dragging hard. Not caring that the dust will stain her clothes.

She’s still waiting there when the Oblige comes limping up. Watches the towering white of its shoulders above the treeline, tracks it until it emerges.

One of its wings is barely attached, mangled in a way she never imagined glass before. Like someone had melted it down and then grabbed it between their hands and twisted. But that’s the worst of the damage, really, and Gucci gives her a leisurely wave from the cockpit as she approaches. Hardly any worse for wear. The Oblige kneels, a little unsteady, to let her out.

“Well,” she says, when her feet finally touch down on solid ground, “That could have been worse.”

Clementine glowers. She takes a halting step towards Gucci, unsure exactly what she wants to do. Over the last hour of waiting, her adrenaline’s worn down.

And then Meridian pulls up in a rover and they’re all fussing over Gucci in the most irritating way, and whatever she was going to do doesn’t matter anymore. Clementine says nothing. She’s not even listening, really, too busy luxuriating in the fullness of her anger. Gucci handled herself, can handle herself without her help. No, she’s fine, no, no one was hurt, no, there’s no way the Oblige is flying several hours over the open water in this state.

The bad news, then, comes with Tone in the doorway, the radio headset slung around their neck. Announcing that Icebreaker can’t send a carrier until tomorrow. Clem feels her fists curl up, unbidden, in frustration. What they actually mean is they don’t feel like it tonight, without anyone there barking orders at them. Maybe they’re throwing another party without her.

They argue back and forth for a few minutes, but she isn’t really hearing it. She doesn’t understand—maybe the shooting had been louder than she realized, maybe her ears are blown out. For some reason she can’t stop looking at Gucci, and not in the usual way. Her eyes can’t settle moving from point to point on a list she doesn’t really understand. Head to chest to stomach, neck and arms and legs, checking boxes. All healthy, all fine.

Gucci shakes her head and sighs. She looks back up at the mech, at the sad shattered joints of its wing.

“It’s fine,” she says, finally, “I’ll stay in town overnight. I don’t like the idea of leaving it unguarded.”

Meridian makes a face, the kind that makes it clear it is not the first time Gucci has insisted on something that makes no sense to her. “ _You_ shouldn’t be left unguarded. We can—”

“I’ll stay with her.”

It snaps out of her, impulsive, before Clementine can really think about it. “That was my ride back, regardless. I would prefer to stay than pack in with the rest of you.” She says, mostly just to make them stop looking at her like that. It’s serious, anyway, she’d rather share breathing space with Gucci than any of the rabble here.

“Alright.” Gucci shrugs, the infuriating slight smile returning to her face. She hates how much that makes her feel better. “We’ll meet back here tomorrow morning, then. Radio when you get in.” Hates, also, how Gucci’s team just listens to her without turning it into an argument. They become a machine again, every part snapping immediately into place. Clem stands there, uncomfortable, while they finish packing up. An extra piece with no purpose. 

The walk back into what could be generously called the center of Resevi is welcome after weeks inside Icebreaker. It’s warm and humid even as the sun goes down, the season steadily tipping further and further into summer.

If she tries, really tries, she can imagine that no part of the last two months has happened. That they’re only strolling on the grounds of the Winter Palace again, that they will part ways and she will go back to her rooms thinking _Gucci Garantine is hiding something_ but not knowing, not knowing…

Gucci stretches, rolls her arm. There’s a little sympathy pain at the motion she knows well; the soreness where the mech’s straps dig in, the ache in her arms from steering hard. “I’d say sorry for dragging you along, but you did insist on inviting yourself.”

“You’re lucky I did.” Clem shoots back. It’s easier, to pretend she’s only upset about being dragged along and nothing else.

Easier not to say any more about the past few hours, and so they don’t. Easier to stumble a little on purpose, to sway an arm just so, until step by step their fingers end up touching. Entirely deniable. She’s so focused that she hardly realizes how dark it’s gotten by the time they reach Resevi, the last red light of Girandole still straining over the horizon.

There’s only one place in town that could charitably be called a hotel, the very same where she had hosted Cas’alear a few weeks ago. The person at the front desk is thankfully unfamiliar, tall and purple-scaled, but she lets Gucci deal with the reservations anyway. It’s her fault they’re here in the first place. Clem busies herself examining the décor of the makeshift lobby. It all looks cheap. She thinks of her room—not in the palace but on Icebreaker. Of curling up in her fine bedding, surrounded by her things.

Well, it’s too late now.

Gucci waves her over and soon they’re being escorted up a rickety flight of stairs. To a single door, as if her pride and need for space hasn’t been trampled on enough today.

“I find it hard to imagine,” she snaps at the attendant, “That a place like this has no other vacancies.”

They just shrug, look down at their watch. Upon closer inspection they’re probably even younger than she is, just tall. “Not that big a place, y’know.”

Clem opens her mouth to eviscerate them and their entirely family line, but Gucci cuts in with a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine,” she says, smoothly, “My partner is just tired. The bed has plenty of room for both of us.”

And, as it turns out, it does. It’s nothing compared to what she’s used to, but she supposes most people would consider it queen-sized. The linen sheets are pleasantly cool in the humid night air coming in through the window. If she tries, she can see what might be the Prophet’s Sea, an even darker line out in the night. Somewhere out there, Icebreaker waits.

She lays there while Gucci takes her time washing up, and tries not to stare at the bathroom door. Tries not to think about Gucci stripping out of her gear and into the shower and how little it would take to join her. Tries, also, not to think about why exactly she’s so angry that it warrants this level of sulking. Surely she’s just irritated at being here and not—well, not home. Somewhere else.

Gucci emerges after a little while in only a towel, her hair wrapped up in red silk. It’s not a move, not an invitation. She fits as easily into place in this moment as anywhere else. Clem tries to avoid looking at her bare shoulders. Nothing she hasn’t seen before, really, but there’s still something that feels dangerous, always, about looking too hard. Especially when she catches herself not looking appreciatively so much as checking for injuries.

Trying to clean herself up is another kind of nightmare. Thankfully, she’d gotten used to a more minimal routine during their desert operation. Really this isn’t even half as bad. At least she’s not sleeping in a tent in the middle of a sandstorm.

Still, back then it had always felt deep down like if she got tired of it she could always leave. Could always go home the next day and face her mother’s wrath instead. Not that this was ever really an option, not for her, but at least she had the illusion of it. There’s no call she could make now that would take her home.

She strips out of her carefully chosen outfit, folds the long coat meticulously and then gives up on the rest. Really, how ridiculous…she hadn’t packed at all, much less the appropriate garments to spend the night. Of course, her underclothes are as fine as anything she owns, pale reinforced silk, meant to protect her from the worst scraping of her mech’s straps.

She turns this way and that in the mirror, checking herself. The new additions stand out horribly: the little whorls of scar tissue across her stomach, the unruly hair curling around her face. She looks small without her clothes. Unfamiliar. Worry, she decides, is not a good look on her.

Clementine stares herself in the eyes, focuses until everything else blurs. Imagines her face on the head of a sphinx. It will be beautiful. It will be glorious. It will.

When she leaves the bathroom, Gucci has already turned out the lights and made her way into their bed. She’s not asleep—Clem can tell, in that finely honed sense that comes from knowing someone too long—but her eyes are closed, her body curled politely onto her side of the bed.

Clem tries, really tries to look the other way as she slips under the covers. But once she’s there she can’t resist turning over, her eyes snapping closed as she does, as if she will be safe so long as she doesn’t actually _see_ Gucci.

For a minute, there’s only the dark, no sound but the distant ocean. Clem is aware, suddenly, that she’s holding her breath. Both of them must be, because she can’t hear Gucci’s breathing unless she really tries to listen for it.

She opens her eyes.

And Gucci does so at the same time. Both of them staring, unbreathing—then she can’t help but laugh at it, the seriousness of it, so teenage—and Gucci is laughing with her and she can breathe again, easy.

“Been a while since we did this,” Gucci says as they’re both coming back together. “Is it strange to say I’ve missed it?”

Clem swallows. She has missed it, has thought of it. Of drunken after-party sleepovers. Of hiding under blankets together and hushing each other’s laughter to avoid being scolded for staying up too late. Of the warm weather of another planet, a summer night spent laid out in a tent together, examining the constant stars of the Principality’s sky. “No. It only—well. It seems silly now.”

Gucci smiles at that, the clever little curve visible even in the dark. “The things that seemed so important then…” She stretches, languid, and rolls onto her back. A sliver of grey light from the window moves along the line of her body as she whispers, conspiratorially, “So, Clementine, who do you have a crush on?”

It’s a joke. She’s joking. A nice, easy shot for her to return. All she has to do is play along.

Instead she turns over so she’s facing the window instead. This is safe. If she can’t see Gucci she is far less likely to do something stupid. Safer if she’s looking only at the quaint stupid town and the quaint stupid room and the quaint stupid bedsheets.

The silence stretches on. She can’t tell how long it’s lasted but it feels like hours. Clem closes her eyes. Her head is still buzzing. She tries to focus on anything. Tries to clear her mind and think of the future, or imagine herself back in the palace, sinking into plush blankets. Her body stays tense, a string pulled so taut it’s about to snap.

“Gucci,” she casts out, hesitant, so quiet she hopes she can’t be heard. “Are you still awake?”

And she thinks, hopes, the answer will be no. But then she can hear the soft sigh, feels the shift of weight behind her. “Yes,” comes the reply, no less quiet. As if their tiny hotel room were a Divine temple that they’re trying not to disturb. “Can’t sleep?”

This is safe. So long as she can’t see Gucci, it’s safe.

“No,” she admits, and closes her eyes. It’s safe. It’s fine. “Would you—can you come closer?”

There’s a long, quiet moment. And then she feels movement again and then—the warmth of another body against hers. Warm and alive. “Like this?” She can feel Gucci’s chest pressed to her back, their hips slotted together. Maybe it’s an apology. Maybe it’s something else.

Clem takes a long, slow breath, feels it echo behind her. “Yes.” Tomorrow she will pretend this never happened. For now, she reaches back, fumbling for Gucci’s arm, and drags the offending limb over her side. They shift back and forth for a few moments, adjusting until they fit, if not perfectly, right enough.

She has never done this before, not really, and her brain is turning in circles trying to decide if she likes it or not. But her body has made its decision, relaxed into the warmth and the sensation she cannot name. And soon, regardless of her thoughts, she drops off into nothing.

She wakes with her face pressed into Gucci’s back in a very undignified manner. It’s still early in the morning, pale light flooding the room.

If Gucci is at all bothered by her position, she doesn’t show it, still peacefully asleep. She looks like a painting, unfairly perfect even in her sleep. It’s weird to see her so still—there’s always a certain energy to her, more reminiscent of Motion than their own Past.

And now she’s just…quiet. Barely moving but for the subtle rise and fall of her back. A movement so subtle she only knows because they’re so tangled together.

It’s not the most comfortable situation. Maybe that’s why she never does this. Her leg is starting to lose feeling a little where it’s pinned under Gucci’s own. She can’t entirely relax, can’t stop thinking about how she must look right now. How ridiculous. Her hair must be a mess.

Clementine closes her eyes again, presses a little closer. Tries to focus on the warmth of another body against hers, on the perfect softness of Gucci’s skin. She doesn’t get all that nonsense that Gur and Valence talk about, the true Divine and everything. _But if you’re out there_ , she thinks, _please stop time, just for a little bit. Please let this moment go on just a little longer. I will reward you for it._

But the true Divine either doesn’t exist or, more likely, hates her. It’s less than a second before Gucci is stirring, turning over and stretching just enough to push her arm away. Clementine doesn’t move a muscle.

“Clementine,” comes Gucci’s voice, and has it ever sounded so nice, soft and rough from sleep? “Are you awake?”

She doesn’t move. Doesn’t say anything, and doesn’t even know why, really.

She keeps her eyes closed as Gucci gets up, lays there listening to the sounds of her moving about the room. Her stomach hurts. Maybe she’s sick again. It feels unbearable. Sometime in the night her anger had ceased to be a luxurious sulk, has coiled itself into something else. Pinned down by it, she can’t do anything but lay still.

And then suddenly she’s being shaken awake, gently, a familiar hand on her arm.

Clementine makes a displeased sound into the pillow. She can’t remember falling back asleep. Maybe waking up had been a dream after all. Gucci laughs slightly, not unkind, as she blinks into awareness.

“Rise and shine.” She already looks immaculate. Her expression is a little fond, mostly just amused at Clementine’s general state of disorientation. “Our ride’s nearly here.”

They dress. They eat. They walk outside into a town already up and at work, the scant few hours of darkness having passed as quickly as if they never happened. Gucci leaves an amount of money that seems unreasonable at the unoccupied front desk. They don’t talk about it, any of it, because there’s nothing to talk about.

The carrier is waiting for them at the docks, as promised. It takes some doing for Gucci to climb back in the Oblige and maneuver it into place, kneeling in supplication on the deck of their ship. Its mangled wing shrieks in complaint as it moves. The crystalline interior glitters, newly exposed to the sun.

Clementine tries not to watch. She wonders if anyone told her team where she’s gone. Or if they’ve noticed at all.

The ride back is, at least, a little less cramped; a repurposed mech transport that could easily carry twice their number. It’s a relief. She’s not sure she could bear sharing that little space again right now. Instead she takes up a position at a railing, watches the seemingly infinite expanse of water stretch by. Eventually she stops seeing the white caps of the waves and it all turns into a blue-green blur.

Clementine leans forward, lets her arms hang over the railing. Even with the wind whipping her coat around her it’s warm here, under the sun, and the faint spray coming off the water feels nice.

She tries not to notice Gucci coming up beside her. Stealing her perfectly good stretch of railing and disturbing her peace. She didn’t ask for company, thank you very much.

“Are you still mad at me?” Gucci asks, her voice soft and low and so very close.

“I’m not mad at you.” She lies, easily. It comes easier to her lately. “I didn’t sleep well.”

Because she’s not looking, she’s taken entirely off guard by Gucci leaning in and kissing her cheek. It’s so light it almost hurts, a weightless, thoughtless sort of gesture that can easily be denied. “That’s good, because—”

Someone calls for her, then, not for Gucci but for Saint Dawn. She gives Clem that polite little _hold on_ smile that always works on nobles and Clem nods in return, hates herself for it. Turns back to the water and feels her face burning. She doesn’t come back.

When they dock with Icebreaker, people are waiting. For Gucci, of course, and the rest of Horizon. Some of them her people, some just fans of her work, Clementine supposes. Everyone loves a good terrorist. Or something like that. There are no cheers, it’s nothing like the old military parades, but people are happy to see her back in one piece.

No one’s waiting for her, not even Sovereign, so Clementine slips away in the noise. Doesn’t sulk or stomp, doesn’t draw attention to herself, just goes, lets the corridors guide her back to her room. She’s just tired, that’s all. She didn’t sleep enough.

It’s a mess getting in there, stepping over furniture and she doesn’t even know what else. Everything had seemed so necessary, so charming. Now it’s just taking up space. Tomorrow, she decides, she will have to downsize. Only a little, of course, but it will at least be satisfying to throw some things into the ocean.

It was supposed to feel good collapsing into her bed again. It should be a relief to have more than one pillow and to know the thread count of her sheets and to have space to stretch out without worrying about anyone else.

Instead the room feels too big. No, not exactly that, not like her room back in Cruciat, all empty space and high ceilings that make her things look paltry by comparison. Here in her comparatively cramped cabin there’s more a lack of something than an excess. A shape that hasn’t been filled in, some white noise that should be playing.

On instinct she rolls onto her side and closes her eyes. Maybe she says something, maybe not. It doesn’t matter, with no one there to whisper back.


	4. azimuth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue. Things change, things stay the same.

The next week brings heavy storms, the biting wind and rain dashing the hopes of an early summer. Still, Icebreaker holds firm in its place. It folds its limbs inwards, locks itself down. It is impenetrable even to nature.

Since they can’t safely venture off or go up to the flight deck, Clementine has chosen to take her refuge in Icebreaker’s steam room--though it’s generous to call it that. She is endearing in her consistency, has always liked the cold but hated the rain. Ever since they were kids. Gucci had thought, upon first hearing of her assignment to Partizan, that Cruciat was the perfect sort of place for her with its dry and biting winter.

As much as Gucci prefers to be getting things done, this is nice too. The pace on Icebreaker has lately been in a strange state of flux. People are talking less. Doing more. It suits her well. She’s enjoyed these talks for what they are, loves a good philosophical project, but finally it seems like this is more than just a group of people talking in a room. It’s becoming a coalition. A movement.

And that does bring its own challenges. It’s always been quite a task, balancing her jobs, but after several weeks off she was unprepared for the stress of getting back to piloting. So when Clementine offers distractions like these, she takes them. It’s just practical, really.

The thermae of Icebreaker are clearly that of a military carrier, meant to stimulate the scales and ease the aching muscles of its troops in a crowded, efficient burst. The excess heat and water of the fortress courses behind the faux-clay walls. Nothing like some of the luxurious bathhouses she’s been to, with fine tile walls and attendants carrying refreshments.

But it will do, especially with the new chill in the air. It's soothing, comfortable, and most importantly private. The sound of the hissing pipes does wonders to hide anything they might get up to.

They have, as the afternoon has taken its course, mostly finished getting up to things. 

Clem hasn't bothered to put her towel back on, using it now as a pillow so she can recline on the bench comfortably. Her eyes are mostly closed, whether in thought or just dozing off it’s hard to tell. Always hard to tell with her, at what point the redolent lazing about is something calculated.

It's not an immediate invitation, really, now that they're both thoroughly worn out, but it's an open-ended one. So Gucci feels free to look. She always does, of course, but even when they mess around it's fairly rare that all their clothes come off. And she's usually quite distracted at the time. Strange to think this might be the first time--at least in years--she's really looked at Clementine naked. She’d never been shy about it before. There was a time when it felt easy and normal for Clem to duck into her room and change while they were going over petty matters of state. It never seemed so charged as this.

It feels a bit like going through museum row with her tutors. Looking through the old sculptures and knowing all the words that would get her good marks, but at a loss for how to describe which ones moved her. Clementine is pretty, sure. She always has been, in the classical way: aristocratic and ideal, though not as tall as her mother, a thing which certainly troubled her. Now she’s a little more than just pretty. It’s hard for her to put her finger on how, exactly, but even the familiar parts of her seem somehow more dangerous.

And there are the scars, creeping up the soft line of her waist and under her chest, speckled across her stomach. Tiny knots of tissue, dotted around the edges with stitch marks. Some smaller, thinner lines that weren't even stitched. Gucci knew they were there, of course, has glimpsed them plenty of times. But seeing the injury so plainly mapped out like this is different. They stand out, even on her pale skin. Completely uncovered it's impossible not to notice them.

Not for the first time, Gucci debates asking what happened. She had heard, at the time, that a mission had gone badly and the following surgery had gone even worse. But they don't look like surgery, they look like the worst kind of shrapnel and she wonders how Clementine Kesh of all people would have put herself in such a position. It’s hard to help being intrigued.

They are also undeniably appealing.

Clementine catches her looking, her eyes slightly open and wary like a cat. But instead of telling her to stop, she asks, “Why did you send me all that? When I was in the hospital, I mean.”

It’s not a question she was expecting. “I was being politely threatening.”

“Not the card. The food and things.”

“Oh.” She hadn’t thought about it really, not at the time and not since. “It seemed like the right thing to do. Since I couldn’t be there myself.” It’s not like anyone else was going to. Although, if she had really understood how bad it was…she can’t say she would have abandoned her mission, but she would have considered it at least for a moment.

“Hm.” Clementine stretches as she sits up. She adjusts herself, straightens up her hair. Drapes the towel over her shoulder just so that it covers the scars. “We're probably not going to be able to do this anymore.” She says. _This_ being an hours-long leave of absence to bathe in the middle of the day. But Gucci can feel the unspoken question there. What about the rest of their _this_?

It is both an honest question and, like everything with her, a test. “Probably not.” She admits. She’s thought about it too. The more time they spend like _this_ , the more chance people have to whisper about it. It may be fine for now, but she intends to take an active role in this budding revolution. She can’t afford to be accused of being distracted, of wasting her time with noble frivolity. Even if it’s somewhat true. “But I suppose we'll see what happens.” There’s not much more she can offer than that.

Clem’s shifting has brought them close enough to touch again, a slight brush of shoulder to shoulder, thigh to thigh, almost unbearable in the heat. A sharper hiss of steam through the piping—Icebreaker is moving, maybe. She can almost hear, beyond a hundred layers of metal walls, the rain drumming down. “I think Gur Sevraq is planning on making a speech soon. Making this all official. Giving people a chance to get out.”

So she’s felt it too. Gucci has long since made up her mind, of course, but she still has to ask. “Are you going to stay?”

Clem gives an unpleasant little laugh at that. “What else am I going to do? It’s not like I could go home.” Having said something a little too truthful, she looks away, stares at the tile patterns of the floor as if they mean anything.

“You’d figure something out.” Gucci says, because what else can she say? _Sorry that you’ve committed sedition but technically so have I, don’t worry we’ll get through this together?_

“There’s nothing else I want.” Clementine breathes deep, lets the steam soak into her lungs. The little whorls of scar tissue move with the motion of her belly, her chest. “Gucci, I need you to know that I’m serious about this. No matter what happens here. This place and everyone in it could sink for all I care. No matter how all this works out, I will take the throne.”

It’s not new information, but it’s different from what’s come before. Not a confession or a hasty promise but a declaration. She lets it settle a moment before she turns to look Gucci in the eye, and asks: "Can I count on your support?" Her tone is not demanding, but firm and deeply serious.

The thing is that it would be so easy to say yes, and lie. Worse, it would be so easy to say yes and even mean it, unite their forces before this begins in earnest and thus ensure by majority that this revolution goes the way they want it to.

"Absolutely not." Gucci says, with nothing to soften that blow. "Horizon will only fight for what we believe in."

And Clementine Kesh is not that, at least not yet. Whether or not she _can_ be is a question only she can answer.

From the way she’s glaring, she knows that just as well. Gucci returns the look, and for a moment they’re staring each other down like there was the barrel of a gun between them. She hadn’t been able to see it then, but months ago she shared that same look with a stranger on the battlefield. It electrifies her the same way now.

Then Clementine laughs again, sharp and humorless. "I'd expect nothing less."

It’s with remarkable caution and self-restraint that she leans in to carefully lay her head on Gucci’s shoulder. This is the sort of thing she should probably put a stop to.

When she leans back in return, Clem’s shoulders drop in what might be relief. Her towel slips down slightly and Gucci can’t help eyeing the blooming bruise on her collarbone, just low enough that it could be covered. Normally it’s Clem who feels the need to be so mouthy, but something had compelled her to leave a mark. To show her for a moment, the value of patience.

It won’t last long. Maybe a few more days, maybe less.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find me on twitter @aglayalilich if you want to discuss what, exactly, is with that clementine kesh woman


End file.
